Horror Movie Reviews: Jennifer's Body, The Mist, Mama, The Shining
Subscribe to our Newsletter for more artworks and coupons
Find my work at:
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
Jennifer's Body Teenage Horror Movie Review
Jennifer's Body is a perfect example on what not to do in a horror movie. Putting the true intentions of the creators aside, this movie was pretty peachy, for a horror movie. It did have the proper elements. As for the comedy, it did have some witty moments here and there. For now, I want to discuss its one and only flaw.
Originally, this movie was targeted to the teenage horror movie audience. All the characters in the movie were teenagers living the scary teenage experience. Heck, the climax of the movie took place at the prom. However, thanks to technology, the creators went crazy with the special effects. The movie was so violent that it was rated R.
Here is where the true hilarity of the movie comes in. A teenager cannot watch a rated R movie without adult supervision. Most times, teenagers wish to watch horror flicks with their cute dates. So, they are not likely to bring their parents to supervise their dates. Plus, most parents are still hesitant to let kids watch violent movies. They imagine that their kids have a monkey see, monkey do mentality (which they do most of the time). Taking these facts into consideration, the target audience had several restrictions to watching Jenifer's Body.
Due to such a stupidity, this movie has all, but been forgotten. Another problem about the movie was the theme. It shows the consequences of unprotected sensual relationships. In this case, the guys after Jennifer needed more than a condom to protect themselves from the blood thirsty demon chick. This theme in specific, caused a lot problems. Mostly because teenagers are not looking for lectures in their horror movies.
There is also the generic theme that all actions have consequences. Jennifer became a succubus demon because of her unscrupulous behavior. Her best friend Needy is also guilty in the movie. Since they were children, she was always covering up Jennifer's misgivings. For her attempt to help Jennifer, after she became a demon, costs Needy dearly (considering that the movie started with her in Jail).
Thinking about it, the whole being sent to jail thing is a common fear among teenagers. Since the movie began, Jennifer's Body reminded the audience that their actions have consequences. In the theater movie version, Needy was sent to a madhouse. Anyhow, such a theme is never popular among reckless teenagers, who wish to validate their own recklessness.
Another interesting subject matter is summarized in the title of the movie. Needless to day, all in the movie were obsessed about Jennifer's Body. Heck, even Needy had a lovy, dovy moment with Jennifer. Many teens are obsessed with hot bodies. The victims of Jennifer were obsessing about her hot looks. Jennifer had a Narcissistic love for her looks. Even Needy wished to have a body like that of Jennifer. It's ironic considering what was Jennifer's true body like.
There is also the issue with Satan. The rock band sacrificed Jennifer in exchange for fame and fortune. As it is usual with making deals with the devil, the sacrificed backfired (eventually). One should never make deals with the devil. Then again, Jennifer was not a virgin to begin with. It's a bummer because they imagined that Jennifer was a Virgin.
Even before they took her, Jennifer even joked about how there was not one inch of her that was a Virgin. Needless to say, when choosing a sacrifice, make certain that you are not offering used goods to the devil. Then again, the fact that Jennifer was no saint, might have been part of having the deal backfire. Putting devil worshipers aside, I must say that this a good movie.
The Mist Horror Movie Review
The Mist is a Horror movie based on a Steven King novella. This is one of those survival horror movies. It shows you some ways in which the people react to a crisis. Some come together, others break down and act stupid. In this case, the characters took a more apocalyptic approach to the whole mist situation. The origin of the monsters is never explained. Nor does it have to be explained. For our purposes, it is best to focus on the characters.
Now, let us begin. The movie starts with a terrible storm. It is followed by a creepy mist. Our main character is a father and his kid. The earlier storm had caused some damage to his property. He took his kid to the store to buy supplies. As he drove along, the mist grew. Eventually, he made it to the store and thus bought the supplies. When he was about to get out there comes a guy screaming. He is frightened by something inside the mist.
He tells them all to stay inside. Some try the experiment of leaving. However, they do not return. Only one person does venture to go outside. A mother leaves to find her two children back at home. On the meantime, there is this doomsayer old hag who starts making things worse. Eventually, the people inside the market do start seeing parts of the mist monsters. From then on, the movie is pretty simple.
Mama (2013) Horror Movie Review
I have yet to see the Mama movie. Its coming soon to theaters, this Friday. I have a good feeling about it. This is no ordinary horror movie. The screenplay was written by the guy who wrote Pan's Labyrinth ( a 5 stars worthy movie I have yet to rate). It was produced by Guillermo del Toro. That guy has a good eye for movies. Anyhow, what first thing that intrigued me about this movie where the little girls. From what I could get from the promos, the movies is about two little girls. One is named Lilly and the other Victoria. They were lost in the woods for 5 years. As such, they developed feral child behavior. I thought it was pretty cool the whole feral child concept. It is not one we often see in movies. Anyhow, a hunter found them inside a decrepit house.
Their uncle had been searching for the girls for a long time. Since they were the kids of his dead sister, he felt attach to them pretty quickly. I thought that the psychology sessions with the girls were pretty cool. They way they were being analyzed was pretty accurate. In my Psychology class, we dedicated a special session to feral kids. Needless to say, I saw lots of real videos and read real reports on that subject matter. Anyhow, the girls managed to survive because their mother's spirit was looking after them. When they moved to their new home, the spirit followed them there.
The issue is that this Mamma is not too happy about being replaced. Her spirit grows violent when she sees that her little girls are getting attached to her brother and her wife. Once the cat (or the ghost) is out the bag, things in the Mama movie go from bad to worse. In this scary movie, they have the classical monster in the closet gig. They also have the girls too used to the paranormal horror gig. Meaning, that the girls just act plain weird and animal like most of the time. Then again, considering that they were raised by a poltergeist, its no wonder they are a bit loony.
Then again, it's only the younger girl that is the most bizarre. Her older sister still has some faint memory of living like a normal human. Thus, Mama is closer to the younger girl. Let's see, there is also the creepy, crawling contortionist trick. There is also the passing through walls gig. I also remembered a cool trick done with a flash camera. I think those are all the horror special effects that appeared in the trailer. I think that is everything worth mentioning about the Mama movie.
The Shining Horror Movie and Miniseries Review
The Shining is one of those classical Steven King horror movies. I watched the movie and the mini-series. Both were 5 stars worthy. The movie version is more in tune with the book. Our main character is a burnt-out writer who has drinking problems. He is in recovery. One day that he was drunk, he accidentally broke the arm of his little kid. Ever since then, his wife has been afraid of him. She will not let him forget what he did their little boy.
One day, to make meets ends, they go to the Overlook Hotel. There the owners hired them to be hotel sitters. Thus, the couple and their little kid got to go there. The writer hopes that the isolation helps him focus on his writing. In the hotel, the little kid discovers that he has the Shining. The chef tells him that should he get in trouble, he could use his powers to call him.
Contagion Horror Movie Review
Contagion is a horror movie about a virus. It spreads via physical contact. If your touch an object held by someone infected, you get infected. The movie begins in a Casino. There we see a pretty maiden asking for people to take her photo. She then goes to see her lover boy. This maiden seems to have common cold. They are the first signs of this new virus.
After seeing her lover boy, she returns home to her husband. She still has the "cold". For a while, she refuses to go to the hospital. Eventually, her husband does take her to the hospital. There she dies. She was the first victim of this new virus. At first, the husband could not believe that she died of a common cold.
From then on, the movie becomes about people dealing with the virus. A lot of crazy things happened along the way. Overall, the movie gives you the step by step of how the world would deal with a pandemic.
Orphan (2009) Horror Movie Review
The Orphan is a pretty bizarre horror movie. This tale is designed to turn people off from adoption. Now, onto the story. A couple had a still life baby. The wife got really depressed. To make matters worse, the wife lost her womb with her baby. As such she became infertile. To preserve the memory of her lost baby, she buried his ashes in a pot.
She then grew some plants out of her baby's ashes. As time passes, the family decides to adopt a kid. They go to adopt a girl in a Catholic orphanage ran by nuns. While looking through the kids, the husband wonders off. He meets a cute girl named Esther, who is painting. She painted some cute tiger cubs and their mom. The husband liked Esther a lot. He introduced her to his wife.
After this brief intro, the Orphan Esther is taken home. It's not as if the couple did not have any kids. They already had two children. One is a boy and the other a deaf girl. This adoption procedure is a bit unusual. Usually, families adopt either babies or children younger, than their kids. Considering how everything turned out, one should not judge appearances.
The Woman in Black Scary Movie Reviews
Last night, I watched the Woman in Black with my family. My mother recommended it, after she tried seeing the movie alone. It was so scary that it nearly gave her a heart attack. It is not so much the spooks, but the tension built around the film. The woman in black keeps you at the edge of your seat. It also gives you a little something to think about after the movie is over. It certainly gave me a lot to think about. Now, let us begin with the review. The movie begins in a very eerie fashion. Three little girls are playing with their dolls. Out of the blue, they seem to see someone.
They then turn their gaze toward the window. Simultaneously, these girls jump out the window, to their death. Outside, we hear a wailing mother yelling, “My Babies!!”. From this scene, we jump to Harry Potter. In this movie, he plays Arthur Kipp, a widowed lawyer, who has a four-year-old son. He has been suffering a terrible depression, ever since his wife died. This is quite noted in the detail of the drawings of his little boy. You see, he drew his daddy as a sad stick figure with a traveling bag. His son always sees his father depressed. To make matters worse, he is on the verge of losing his job. This is his final chance to prove himself, else they kick him out of the firm.
His assignment is to get the paperwork necessary to sell the Eel Marsh House. Needless to say, they sent him on an almost impossible assignment. That house is haunted by the Woman in Black. At first, the movie does not shed too much light into the superstition about the Woman in Black. Like in most superstitious films, the towns people are reluctant to talk about it with outsiders. They fear to be taken as mad. Some even try, to convince Arthur not to go to the Eel Marsh House. However, he has to go there to look through all the papers. He is determined to do his job, for the sake of his son. Ah, the things one does for one’s kid. The irony of the film is that his determination to sell the house led to his ruin. I am not going spoil the ending. Now, onto the woman in black. The woman in black is a personification of death.
I noticed that all the “woman in black” related deaths occurred when the kids where left unsupervised. Those kinds of tragedies happen very often. A good example is the girl that drank lye. I looked information on Lye. Lye was a very common household item. It was used to preserve food and to make soap. Many lye pellets looked like candy, at a first glance. It was easy for children to swallow them, mistaking them for candy.
In other lye related kids' death, it would happen as thus. In the old days, the lye in its liquid form would be stored in everyday kinds of bottles. The kids would mistake them for water and drink it. In no time, their stomachs would explode. I know this from experience. In Cuba, a lot of kids died of lye. Mother used to see hundreds of lye related cases at the hospital she worked at. As for the first balcony scene, there have been hundreds of cases of kids jumping out off windows. It's never good to leave kids unsupervised. Specially, when they are playing in the top floor.
One never knows what they will feel like doing. Kids, at a young age, do not have a good grasp on their mortality. Therefore, it is explainable that the three girls would think they would not die from jumping out the window. As for the drowned kid, well... just about anyone can drown in the beach. There is nothing supernatural about his death. Although, for the movie purposes, his death was blamed on the woman in black. If you think about it, she was a being created for the sole purpose of blaming parent’s neglectfulness on her. The girl who caused the fire, was obviously a pyromaniac. One gets those kinds of brats from time to time.
Lastly, the one who was ran over in the train was also a common death. Even if your kids is right next to you, you should not assume that they will not do something stupid. The minute that his father let go of his hand, that made him the next victim of the woman in black. Another thing I liked about the woman in black was the use of animals. The crow taking care of its chicks inside the Eel Marsh House represented the ideal mother. She was always watchful of her chicks. Think about it, Arthur left the window open for her, yet she did not abandon her chicks. Another interesting bird brain was the little bird that imitated sounds. In one of them, he mimicked the sound of a sobbing lady.
Now onto the dogs. The dogs are a traditional symbol of death. There were also the interesting twins of the old seer hag. When she started feeding her doggies with a spoon, we had a good guess of her state of mind. As for Arthur’s temporary pet dog, he warmed Arthur whenever the Woman in Black approached. That way she could not take him by surprise. The little doggie had more balls than all the guys in the film. He truly did not fear the ghost woman.